


tall, dark and fishy

by demonsorceress



Series: angst meme [3]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: CW: mentions of blood and wounds, F/F, Neighbors AU, prompt: minor injury, writing meme
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-28
Updated: 2014-10-28
Packaged: 2018-02-22 22:37:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,259
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2524232
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/demonsorceress/pseuds/demonsorceress
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jemma is pretty sure her neighbor isn't a scientist like she claims—if the guns, combat outfits and the whole "showing up with an ugly wound in the middle of the night" thing are any indication.</p>
            </blockquote>





	tall, dark and fishy

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: minor injury, sent by barbara--morse.  
> This is not angst at all and I'm sorry, I didn't have any ideas for this prompt but I came up with the neighbors AU thing so I had to use it. Also, it's the third time I turn what was supposed to be a drabble/ficlet into a full one-shot. Oops.

Jemma might not have the best investigative skills in the world, but she’s pretty sure her neighbor isn’t a scientist like the woman claims. (She swears she’s not a stalker.)

First of all, saying that the woman _lives_ in the apartment next to hers would be an understatement. It would be more accurate to state she sleeps there most days—she leaves first thing in the morning and rarely ever comes back before midnight, _if_ she comes back at all. Sometimes she disappears for several days, even a couple of weeks. A person with a normal routine wouldn’t even get to see her in the building, but Jemma is always up late at night and early in the morning due to her busy schedule and messed up shifts at the hospital.

Jemma can’t deny she was interested when the woman moved in; she was gorgeous, so tall that Jemma had to look up to talk to her, mesmerizing blue eyes, beautiful brown hair and a smile that would make Jemma struggle to form a coherent sentence when they were in the elevator together. She introduced herself as Barbara and they’d make small talk sometimes, but after the five months they’ve been neighbors, Jemma is just weirded out.

For starters, not that scientists in general have a certain style, but for a scientist, the way Barbara dresses is unnecessary, to say the least, if not suspicious. Why in the world would a scientist need to wear combat boots so frequently? At first, Jemma would tell herself that's just the woman's personal style and it's really not her concern. That was until Jemma arrived home around 3 in the morning after a long surgery and came across Barbara in the hallway, wearing a full combat outfit.

She said she was coming back from a costume party before wishing Jemma a good night and rushing into her apartment, but unless she bought an actual combat outfit to use as a costume for one night, she was lying. And scientists certainly don't need combat outfits, so Jemma started noticing that the way she usually dresses would make sense for a person who is, in fact, prepared to get physical at work.

The bruises and scars were also a clue. An ugly cut across her cheek one time, a wound on her biceps wrapped in thick bandage the other night, and whenever Jemma threw in a casual question about it, she'd give her vague answers. That added to the weird things Jemma would overhear her saying on the phone sometimes.

Through all that Jemma was still trying to believe she was overreacting, being paranoid, getting too invested in stupid assumptions about her attractive neighbor. And then the gun incident happened.

Okay, it wasn’t exactly an “incident”. Jemma heard a noise outside of her apartment and when she looked through the magic eye on her door, Barbara was standing on the corner, holding a gun. It wasn’t a regular firearm, though; Jemma doesn’t even know what the hell kind of gun was that. It was blue and grey, and didn’t look like it fired normal bullets. The fact that she owns a gun is fishy in itself, but it being a strange high-tech weapon only consolidated Jemma’s skepticism regarding who she claimed to be.

After that, Jemma decided it was better to just completely ignore the mystery of the dubious neighbor, whose name might not even Barbara to begin with. She has more important things to worry about than a neighbor with questionable identity who has never caused her any harm; though, if Jemma’s being honest, the woman could in fact be very bothered if Jemma started sticking her nose where she shouldn’t. Jemma is just glad Barbara doesn’t know she saw the weird gun; it wouldn’t have been easy for her to come up with an excuse to explain _that_. And Jemma is sure as hell she doesn’t want to unsettle someone like that.

(Yes, she’s scared. Jemma has watched enough spy and sci-fi movies to know that it never ends well for the ordinary people who get involved with that sort of thing. Better safe than sorry.)

Her plan of ignoring Barbara’s existence and refusing to think about her was going just fine. Until the day Barbara was bleeding in the hallway.

In slightly different circumstances, Jemma would’ve only done so much as smile politely at Barbara before entering her own apartment when she saw the other woman step out of the elevator and into their floor around one in the morning. Except this time Barbara was limping across the hallway, a nasty wound on her left thigh, blood soaking her pants around it.

Jemma has no idea what could have possibly caused that wound because there’s so much blood she can barely even see it, but it doesn’t seem deep, though Barbara doesn’t look so well, her face a bit pale, forehead covered in sweat.

Jemma can’t just pretend she’s not seeing this. She’s a doctor and her neighbor needs urgent medical care. So she drops her bag on the doormat and immediately rushes toward Barbara, and when the woman looks up at her, Jemma isn’t sure whether she’s alarmed or relieved. She’s clearly not in a position to refuse any help, so when Jemma pulls Barbara’s arm over her shoulder without even thinking, Barbara lets Jemma help her walk the rest of the way across the hallway, but it surprises her when Jemma stops in front of her own apartment and pulls the keys out of her pocket.

“You don’t need to,” Barbara says weakly.

“It’s fine, don’t worry.” Jemma resists the urge to ask what happened to her because that would ruin her plan of not getting involved in this in any way. She’s just going to do her neighbor a favor and take care of that wound regardless of the circumstances that led to her being hurt.

Barbara gives her a grateful smile. Jemma quickly unlocks the door to her apartment and pushes the door open, helping Barbara get inside.

After grabbing her bag from the floor and pulling the door closed, Jemma takes a looks around her living room for a moment, trying to figure out what to do. And she has an idea.

First, she removes everything from the coffee table on the center of the room. Then, she drags the rectangular coffee table from a position parallel to the couch to a perpendicular one, its smaller side right against the couch so that Barbara can sit on it and lay her leg on the table. Good enough.

Jemma begins guiding Barbara there, but the woman stops halfway and pulls away from Jemma. “I’m not getting my blood all over your couch.”

Jemma glares at her and arches an eyebrow. She didn’t even think about that. “I’m sure it can be cleaned.”

Barbara hesitates. “Send me the bill,” she says, finally moving again towards the couch.

Jemma should just stay quiet and agree, but she can’t help it. “I’m offended you think I’d charge you for this,” she blurts out, and Barbara looks confused. “Keeping my couch clean isn’t one of my priorities at the moment.”

She helps lower Barbara into the couch and the woman bites her lip, wincing in pain as she makes an effort not to groan. Jemma then gently pulls her leg up on the coffee table, careful not to cause Barbara much more pain. Barbara grips the edges of the couch and breathes heavily.

 

When Jemma comes back from the bathroom carrying her emergency kit, Barbara looks up at her in disbelief.

“What?” Jemma asks defensively, setting the kit down on the floor next to the coffee table.

“You don’t strike me as the type who would need such a huge emergency kit at home very often,” Barbara says calmly. “How many times have you actually used this?”

Staring at her as she tries to come up with an answer, Jemma realizes she’d forgotten how pretty Barbara is. It’s so unfair that some people can still look this beautiful even when they’re sickly pale and sweaty.

And Jemma doesn’t have an answer. “I like to be prepared,” she retorts. “You never know when you might need to stitch up your neighbor’s leg in the middle of the night.”

Barbara manages to display a faint smile and huff out a breath.

 

Jemma finds the scissors and cuts off the ripped fabric of Barbara’s pants around the wound. After she stops the bleeding and the blood is all cleaned up, the injured skin is clearly visible and Jemma notices it can only be a bullet graze wound. A descending line across her thigh, like the side of her body was facing the person who tried to shoot her in the thigh and missed, only grazing her leg.

Jemma can't help but look up at Barbara, a questioning look in her eyes.

"It's just a flesh wound," Barbara says dismissively. Jemma just keeps looking at her until she remembers that she's talking to a doctor. Jemma is well aware of what a graze gunshot wound looks like. Until Barbara finally says, “You’re wondering why someone tried to shoot me, aren’t you?”

_Yes, neighbor who strangely acts like this is somehow a common occurrence._

“Wondering, yes, of course.” It takes Jemma all of her self-control to keep going rather than waiting to see if Barbara would bother to explain to her what happened. “But it’s none of my business, really.”

And just like Jemma expected, Barbara doesn’t give her a single word of clarification. She just curves her lips into a small smile and stays silent.

However, Jemma thinks this is progress somehow. Barbara didn’t even try to come up with an excuse, anything to explain why a scientist would have almost been shot. It’s like she’s acknowledging that Jemma is aware that she’s hiding something pretty serious, but she can’t say anything about it.

 

Jemma makes sure the wound is cleaned up and disinfected, then stitches and bandages it up. Barbara refuses the pain meds Jemma offers and says that she has her own at home, and that Jemma has already done more than enough for her tonight.

She also refuses when Jemma extends a hand to help her up from the couch, and stands up on her own, heading straight to the door. There’s this awkward couple of seconds where they don’t know exactly what to do, until Barbara runs a hand through her hair and gives Jemma a sweet smile.

“Thank you,” she says. “And I’m _very_ sorry I took your time in the middle of the night and stained your couch with my blood.”

Jemma laughs shyly. It would be so much easier to deal with a mysterious neighbor who owns guns and combat outfits and shows up late at night with graze bullet wounds if she wasn’t so good-looking. And tall.

“Have a good night, Jemma,” Barbara says, stepping out of the apartment.

“Good night, Barbara.”

She turns around, catching Jemma by surprise.

“Your name is Barbara, right?” Jemma instantly blurts out.

Barbara's face breaks into a wide grin, and Jemma is sure she just embarrassed herself. "Yes, it is," Barbara answers. "But no one calls me that." Jemma waits for her to say what she's usually called then, but instead, Barbara asks, "Do you have your phone there?"

Jemma furrows her brows, but searches her pockets for her cellphone and finds it on her coat, hesitantly handing it to Barbara.

She watches as Barbara dials her number and saves it to Jemma's contacts.

As Bobbi Morse.

"If you ever need- any help, or anything, call me," she says vaguely, handing Jemma's phone back to her.

"Alright then... Bobbi."

Bobbi smirks; she kind of likes how her name sounds in Jemma's cute voice.

"You're not a scientist, are you?"

Jemma deeply regrets her impulsive question as soon as Bobbi's smile fades away. Bloody hell.

"I am, in fact," Bobbi responds, and for some reason she doesn't look mad that Jemma is questioning her. If anything, she actually looks... kind of amused? "I could show you my degree, if you'd like. Georgia Tech, PhD in biochemistry. “

Jemma starts babbling apologies, utterly embarrassed, but then Bobbi says, "I don't work as a scientist anymore, though."

And that's all. She's not going to tell Jemma what she really works with now; what she just said was basically "you're right, I was lying, but that doesn't mean I'll tell you the truth."

Alright. At least she's not angry that Jemma knows.

"I have to go," she says. Of course. Jemma mentally kicks herself; they were doing so well, Bobbi had even given her her phone number and the name she liked to be called, and Jemma ruined everything.

Or, Jemma thinks she did. But not really.

"Hey, uh, I said call me if you need anything, but you can call me if you _don't_ need anything too," she says, much to Jemma's surprise. "We could maybe get coffee someday… Or, you know, tea. I don’t know, whatever you want.”

Jemma's jaw nearly drops. If there's one thing she definitely didn't think Bobbi would do tonight, it was suggesting they should go out sometime. And Bobbi, as unbelievable as that is, looks sort of timid and unsure as she says that. Jemma can't help it when her lips curve into a smile.

"Yes, I think I'd like that."

And as Bobbi walks away and into her own apartment, Jemma thinks, she might really call her. Soon.

**Author's Note:**

> So, on a scale of 1 to me, how much can you possibly miss the point of an /angst/ writing meme?


End file.
